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Introduction
A revolution in taxonomic practice is underway that will make taxonomy an even more reliable source of information for ecologists. How taxonomic information is created, tested, accessed, thought about, and used, is changing dramatically with the emergence of cybertaxonomy.
What is Cybertaxonomy?
Cybertaxonomy is a contraction of "cyber-enabled taxonomy." It shares the traditional goals of taxonomy: to explore, discover, characterize, name, and classify species; to study their phylogenetic relationships; and to map their geographic distributions and ecological associations. Through cyberinfrastructure and the adoption of digital technologies, cybertaxomy is able to produce results faster and better than ever before (Wheeler 2008, 2010).
Cybertaxonomy should not be confused with the practice of creating databases of taxonomic information. Databases are an integral part of the process, but cybertaxonomy refers to a wide range of hardware, software, instrumentation, communication tools, and work practices that collectively allow taxonomists to do their work more efficiently while maintaining the highest levels of excellence. Consequently, users will find taxonomic information more reliable, comprehensive, and easily accessible.
Cybertaxonomy, like traditional taxonomy, is integrative. That is, taxonomists pull together, synthesize, and analyze all available evidence that is informative at the taxonomic level(s) being studied. Typical data sources include morphological, molecular, fossil, and ontogenetic as well as ethological, physiological, biochemical, and other sources of data, as appropriate. Cybertaxonomy can be visualized as a GIS-like environment with multiple data layers: morphological, distributional, molecular, image, and sound recordings (to name just a few). In addition, there are layers with algorithms and applications to process data in regard to phylogenetic, temporal, spatial, or ecological relations. Users may activate any combination of "layers" to retrieve desired information in a multi-layered "mesh". The possibilities are numerous and diverse: dichotomous or interactive diagnostic keys, checklists of species in particular areas plotted over seasonal occurrences, distribution maps (point data or predicted ranges based on climate and environment), three-dimensional visualizations of phenotypic variation, etc. Just as individual taxonomists have traditionally synthesized all available knowledge into periodically published monographs, international teams of experts collaborating in cyberspace will be able to assemble and maintain, with up-to-the-minute accuracy, all data and information pertaining to the species of a taxon. Even these taxon knowledge bases will be combinable by ecologists seeking to compare and contrast species that co-occur (or might co-occur, given future climate change, for example) in a particular ecosystem.
State of Cybertaxonomy
When fully implemented, cybertaxonomy will impact nearly every aspect of the creation and use of taxonomic information. Taxonomists require research resources on a scale unlike that of any other life science discipline: primary literature dating back to 1753, thousands of specimens from the full geographic ranges of scores of related species, type specimens to assure nomenclatural stability, and specimens and data from dozens of museums or herbaria in many countries. Cybertaxonomy holds the promise of unprecedented access to such resources, including digital image archives, open-access databases, remotely operable instrumentation, and electronic publishing tools.
Traditional printed sources of taxonomic information are almost always out of date, often by the time of release. Since publication, there may be any number of new species, name changes, distribution records, or natural history observations added, all of which are of great value to the ecologist. Cybertaxonomy will open access to full and current information drawn from a taxon knowledge base that is constantly updated by the taxonomic community.
Cybertaxonomy will increase the arsenal of species identification tools available to the field ecologist, including browser-based field guides, interactive diagnostic keys, automated identifications from photographs, direct access to a specialist, or the collecting of tissue samples for molecular identifications — the latter uniquely useful for associating very dissimilar life stages such as those observed between larval and adult insects.
Uses of Taxonomic Information in Ecology
As taxonomists make more species known, it will become possible to improve and better test assumptions and models on species diversity, distributions, co-occurrences, and co-varying factors; detect climate change; track species losses or gains; deepen our understanding of interactions among species in ecosystems; improve strategies and priorities for conservation; and predict the expansion or contraction of ranges. Among the uses for taxonomic information in ecology are:
Species identifications
Cybertaxonomy will provide a wide range of tools to assist in the immediate and accurate identification of species, the training of field ecologists to identify target taxa, and video-mediated consultation.
Checklists
Cybertaxonomy will make checklists available for particular localities and ecosystems that are complete and up to the minute.
Names
Scientific names are the unique identifiers used to store and retrieve what we know in databases and publications. Cybertaxonomy will allow taxonomists to improve the reliability, stability, and informativeness of names and to retrieve all relevant data and citations recorded under older names.
Phylogenetic Classification
By viewing species within their phylogenetic context, ecologists can make predictions about their contributions to ecological functions. Closely related species frequently have similar food sources, reproductive strategies, physiologies, and behaviors.
Geographic Distributions
Cybertaxonomy is mobilizing the information content of the natural history collections of the world, whose estimated three billion specimens provide a wealth of information about the distributions of species, including irreplaceable historical records.
Virtual Ecological Assemblages
For taxonomic research, specimens are curated according to their phylogenetic relationships. With the tools of cybertaxonomy, the ecologist can virtually reassemble all the specimens, regardless of taxon, collected in any one place at the same time or over a sequence of times.
Conservation-relevant Information
Cybertaxonomy will facilitate access to information about the status, abundance, and rarity of species, the species-richness of particular localities, and other data relevant to conservation evaluation and reserve designs.
Morphologically Structured Information
As image archives grow, incorporating both digitized publications and images of specimens, it will be possible to harvest and analyze such visual information to understand phenotypic variation in relation to environmental conditions, population structure, morphoclines, and other factors.
Online Access to Museum Specimens
Telemicroscopy has been used by pathologists and histologists for decades and will soon be able to network global collections such that actual specimens in addition to stored images may be accessed, manipulated, compared, measured, and studied in real time.
Conclusions
Cybertaxonomy is not only changing the way that taxonomists work but also the ways in which ecologists can access and make use of taxonomic data, information, and knowledge. As new ways to harvest, structure, and analyze taxonomic and related natural history information emerge, ecologists will be able to understand complex ecosystems in greater detail, detect and monitor environmental change more precisely, and more effectively achieve goals for sustainable ecological services.
References and Recommended Reading
Gaston, K. J. & O'Neill, M. A. Automated species identification: why not? Philosphical Transactions of the Royal Society B 359, 655–667 (2004).
Polaszek, A. A universal register for animal names. Nature 437, 477 (2005).
Wheeler, Q. D., ed. The New Taxonomy. The Systematics Association Special Volumes Series 76. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2008.
Wheeler, Q. D. What would NASA do? Mission-critical infrastructure for species exploration. Systematics and Biodiversity 8, 11–15 (2010).
Wilson, E. O. The encyclopedia of life. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 18, 77–80 (2003).
Winterton, S. L. Revision of the stiletto fly genus Neodialineura Mann (Diptera: Threvidae): an empirical example of cybertaxonomy. Zootaxa 2157, 1–33 (2009).
